


the intact asexual aesthetic

by yonderdarling



Series: Doctor/Missy Oneshots [8]
Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Abled writer writing disabled character, Blind Character, Did you expect anything else, F/M, Flashbacks, Kissing, Post-Episode: s10e05 Oxygen, Spoilers, Surprise Kissing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-19
Updated: 2017-05-19
Packaged: 2018-11-02 11:03:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,671
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10943172
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/yonderdarling/pseuds/yonderdarling
Summary: Concept: Missy is about to blurt out a secret of the Doctor's in front of Bill. He's got one way of stopping her. With his face. Spoilers for Oxygen.





	the intact asexual aesthetic

**Author's Note:**

> Briefly, briefly non-consensual kissing. Very briefly. 
> 
> Based on my own tumblr post, "concept: missy about to gleefully announce to bill that the doctor is blind. to prevent this, the doctor grabs missy and smooches her." 
> 
> Hammered out between uni work in a desperate attempt to get something posted before the next episode. Un-betaed.

There's two things he's better at sensing, without seeing, and one surprises him. One is piloting, and the other is smelling.

Well, he's not _better_ at piloting the TARDIS physically, but he's certainly getting a mental workout using the basic psychic controls, telling Bill that the TARDIS just prefers things that way. She probably does, the TARDIS. She's softer than usual with him, less likely to put them in situations that involve flying projectiles or planets that have shin-high, bone-bruising obstacles.

All the stairs have slowly begun to vanish from the TARDIS, except those in the console room. There's ramps, signalled by a change in the floor's material about two metres out from the slope.

The Time Lords may have had a cure for blindness, but it doesn't mean they assumed there'd never be a case of it in one of their machines.

More handrails too. Proximity buzzers. All his clothes end up in colour-order in his wardrobe one morning. 

Nardole is - getting better. It helped, when the TARDIS randomly took them both to the set of some American TV show and dumped them in a corner of the studio while they filmed.

"What - what's that noise on the tape?" someone yells. "We'll need to reshoot this. Michael. Michael. Over here, again, come on."

Noise. Things being wheeled over rough floors. Then, silence. Something snaps sharply - a clapperboard.

"He sounds like House's son," says Nardole, and the Doctor wishes River had programmed the robot with slightly fewer whimsical aspects.

"House's son?"

"You know, the white one."

For a moment, all the Doctor can think of is House, _House_ , the TARDIS-eating, Time Lord-trapping, Time Lord gutting and using for parts, that being, that monstrous being that nearly took the TARDIS from him, and he reaches out behind himself and feels the steady, cool wood of the machine.

"He's got his hand in his pocket," says Nardole.

"Which one?"

Nardole shifts, brushing up against him. That's the new thing too, Nardole has to be in an arm's reach, these days.

"Um. Left. His left hand, left pocket."

The Doctor closes his eyes - useless, but habit, but still _useless_ \- tips his head to one side, and listens.

"Ah," he says, still touching the TARDIS. "Yes, I see. Thanks, dear."

"It's alright," says Nardole, cheerful. "Any time."

"I wasn't talking to you."

 

*** * ***

 

Bill doesn't seem to notice on the short hops they take to quiet islands in the Caribbean, the Royal Conglomerate of Wehlehmena's botanical gardens - focused on fragrances, not vision - and the pitch black beaches of the planet Baseen, where the dolphins sing only on the darkest nights.

He takes special, bitter pleasure in being able to declare that he "can't see a damn thing," when Bill claims she can see some of the animals splashing.

 

 

*** * ***

 

The TARDIS hums around him. He walks, right hand on the console, circling clockwise. A friendly tone in C-major, and he stops, places both hands on the console, reaches up. The screen.

"Thanks, dear," he says, running his thumbs down the edges of the frame. "You probably think I shouldn't hide it. But it's to keep both of us safe."

Another hum.

"You understand."

Silence. Nardole's shuffling footsteps, coming out of the TARDIS's depths. His ankle joints don't work too well on the steeper ramps, but the TARDIS has a favourite, and it's not Nardole. The Doctor runs his hands along the edge of the console again. Turns. Left hand on console, walks counter-clockwise, five steps. Lets go, takes three steps and finds the handrail, which guides him to the door.

 

*** * ***

 

The Pope. Bill. Veritas. Veritas, _Veritas_ , the text that kills those who read it, and he can't see, but he'll be able to save them, stop them, stop it. It smells alien, even after centuries in the Vatican archives, and the paper, though close to feeling like tree fibres from Earth, isn't even from this solar system.

"Don't eat it," Nardole snaps, batting his hand when he lift a tiny torn fragment to his lips. "What if the paper's poisonous?"

"Then there'd be bite marks all over the book from the other people," the Doctor snaps. "And I can't feel those, so, presumably, it's edible."

Nardole taps his shoulder, and the Doctor turns his head back to the pages. Bill shuffles loudly back into the room, wearing those silly shoes that don't stay on her feet properly, humming. Good. He likes that Bill has a presence even without speaking.

"Found anything yet?" Bill asks. "I mean, you don't feel suicidal?"

"No more than usual, no," says the Doctor, reaching up, finding the edge of the pages on the first try, feeling the dry papers under his fingertips.

"Can you put it off for a while?" Bill says, and the Doctor sits up, turns in her direction.

"Why?" Nardole says, saving the Doctor from asking.

Bill's voice comes in higher. "Do you need to wear those sunglasses to read, Doctor? You're a bit overly-committed to your aesthetic."

He's thought of this already. "They're taking pictures, feeding them back to the TARDIS. She knows more languages than I do."

"I thought the TARDIS translated all the languages in the universe."

Nardole makes an impressed little noise. The Doctor scowls.

"She's got a few more in there than I know. If it's not pronounceable by two lungs and a tongue, she usually keeps it to herself."

"Ah. Well," says Bill. "I guess she can look at the pages you've already sent, because the um, the Pope, wants to take you somewhere."

"Where?"

 

*** * ***

 

The _where_ is somewhere through a half-broken teleporter masquerading as a picture frame - Nardole says, it looks like a late Medici offering - and the Papacy seem to believe it is a step to a higher plane.

It's not. It's a two-way teleport to some kind of planet with three small suns - he can feel the off-putting pull of them fighting over the planet's orbit. Still, cold. More nitrogen in the atmosphere than he'd like, but it's breathable.

"This way," says one of the Pope's assistants, and leads them through a corridor - the air grows colder, mildewy. Then a room. The sound of a door opening. "Just wait in here. We're bringing the prisoner to you."

"Prisoner?" the Doctor asks, but there's the unwelcome sound of a slamming door, and then, the even more unwelcome sound of someone locking it.

"They mentioned a prisoner, they caught them trying to get at the Veritas with some kind of - machine," says Nardole. "A doovalacky."

"A doovalacky," says the the Doctor, with a voice drier than the Simpson desert. "How apt."

"Well, they didn't let me see it," says Nardole. "Oops, here they come again. Oh, over there, look."

"Doctor, down the end," says Bill, her voice tight, and the Doctor grits his teeth and spins again, hoping for second time lucky. "Stop messing about, would you?"

He smells a Time Lord, and it's not him. It's not one of their better abilities and one that doesn't come in handy very often, but he tips his head. No, not a Time _Lord_ at all.

"I shouldn't even be surprised," he says, and actually hears Nardole's neck gears whirring as he turns to look at the Doctor. "Who else could it be?"

"Who else indeed," comes Missy's voice out of the darkness, and he can smell the cold tang of space, and the red-rust smell of Gallifreyans, and her perfume, which hasn't changed since he last saw her. Literally. "Doctor, Doctor, Doctor."

He can hear her high heels tapping on the stone ground as she approaches. The Doctor folds his arms. There's a sigh as Missy appraises the situation.

There's a little click, and the Doctor imagines Missy snapping her white teeth at him, sees that red-lipsticked grin. She hums.

"I _see_ you've got a little problem here, Doctor," she says, and his hearts sink. "Cool specs. They're out of sight. And who is this?"

"Doctor?" Bill.

"Missy," says Missy, and the Doctor feels the air move, hears her heels clicking. "Be a good girl and shake my hand. You one of the Doctor's pupils, hm? And, and and, this is Nardole, I see. Wow, both of you are wearing your specs today."

" _Mine_ are necessary," says Nardole. "Missy. I am correct in assuming you're - "

"Yes, I'm that one," says Missy. "Enchanté."

An awkward thirty seconds of silence.

"You're meant to kiss her hand, Nardole," says Bill. "If you won't, I will."

"Nice spotting that one there, Bill. You've got a good eye," Missy says, and her heels are clicking on the floor again.

"Why did you go after Veritas?" the Doctor asks, and Missy must keep circling them, and he turns, following her sound and her scent. "Why?"

"Same reason you did, my dear Doctor. A piece of writing that drives the reader to suicide? It's either Vogon poetry or something from the Carrionites, I'm guessing."

The Carrionites. So obvious, yet he didn't even _think_. She's brilliant, and evil, and could bring it all crashing down around his ears with one sentence.

"I suppose," says Missy, and she trails her fingers along his the back of his neck, smooth, too smooth, and his hearts leap. He realises in a second. She's wearing gloves. Missy pauses, leans over his shoulder. "Now," she says, her tone surprised, breath brushing his cheek. "Even I wasn't expecting these to work that well."

"What?"

"See, Bill, the Doctor here, and I, go way back. Though now I've laid eyes on him, I can see that he's keeping something from - mpppph."

 

*** * ***

 

Missy once said he kissed like a nun, and the Doctor remembers now, sees her clearly, perched up on the bench of some laboratory he was trying to shut down for whatever cruel experiment they'd been enacting.

She had her legs hooked at the ankle, and her collar unbuttoned and that look of utter, sexy dishabille that only comes from her being really, truly bored with imprisonment and willing to help him in shutting down the operation, if only for something to do.

It's those times when he remembers her as his best friend.

But - "A nun," she says, handing him a pair of tongs and a pair of safety glasses, slipping on her own pair. "You've kissed the same way since the first time. These bodies, I mean."

"A _nun_?" In this memory, he takes a millisecond to pause, admires the brightness of her blue eyes behind the plastic, the rich purple of her clothing, bold against the sterile white of the lab. "Why are you going about kissing nuns?"

No answer. Then,

"Well, you're all." Missy draws a shape in the air, flicks a couple of switches on the table that will help vent all the toxic gas out of the facility. "All mouth, no hands. Not even mouth. It's all about the lips. Very chaste."

"Why do the tongues have to touch?" the Doctor asks, opening up a futuristic laptop computer and typing several lines of code. "Wait, this is a form of erratic quadratics I never learnt."

"I designed it, before they locked me up. Shove," says Missy, slipping off the bench and taking over. "It's cross-referenced with an Anadalisuian spiral codex, see? Simple when you know what you're looking for."

The Doctor crosses the room and begins throwing research into the teleporter in the corner. If the humans see what they've done here, hopefully they'll never do it again.

"Why do the tongues have to touch?"

Missy shrugs. "They touch everywhere else, why not in the mouth."

The Doctor pokes his tongue out. Missy keeps typing, sticks her own tongue out at him, pink against her red lips.

"I learnt it off a human, actually," she says. "Bleh. Anyway. My point _is_." She hits a key with a flourish. An alarm begins to wail. "Self destruct in two minutes," she says.

"The facility is empty," says the Doctor, and habit unbreakable after 2000 years, holds his hand out to her. "Come on, Missy."

She grins, wide and genuine, and he grins back, and just for a second, they're friends again.

 

*** * ***

"See, Bill, the Doctor here, and I, go way back. Though now I've laid eyes on him, I can see that he's keeping something from - mpppph."

It's with all this in mind that the Doctor grabs Missy by the face and pulls her in, kissing her with abandon, and thanks whatever Gods are listening that he managed to get her mouth, not her ear or nose. Missy makes a surprised sound, stiffens, then bites his mouth - not to get away, to stop him pulling back. The Doctor drops one hand to her waist, squeezes, and uses the other to cup the back of her head. Missy presses up against him, feeling smaller than usual, strangely, wraps one arm around his hips and leaves the other on his cheek.

There's tongues, then teeth, then tongues again, and an awkward silence outside of his and Missy's breathing, and the faint hum of their hearts all beating faster in time.

Against the edge of his mind there's a buzzing sensation - Missy trying to get in, and he shuts her down by grabbing her arse. He actually feels her jump, feels the nerves in her body moving, triggering the muscles, making her eyebrows rise in surprise, making her hearts beat faster, making her hold him tighter. Missy practically _purrs_.

Someone clears their throat. Then, someone else does. The Doctor forces himself to pull back from Missy - well, his head anyway. His body is encased in her grip, vicelike.

"Should - should we leave you two alone?" Bill asks awkwardly.

"Whatever for?" asks Missy, and her voice is so husky it should be illegal. "Wow."

"Um," says Nardole. " _Sir_. It was bad enough when you and Professor Song did that."

"Oh my God, you're married," says Bill. "Oh my God. Um. Oh my God. To someone else."

"Well, it is short for _Mistress_ ," says Missy. Her words vibrate in the Doctor's chest, and she's still out of breath. "Good lord man, have you been practising on your pillow or something?"

Her arms unwind from around him, and she steps back, leaving the Doctor feeling unsteady. He adjusts his sunglasses. He's 99.8% embarrassed and relieved, but that other 0.2% is a tiny bit proud. He can feel scarlet and rich gold rolling off Missy in waves. She's sweating a tiny bit - he can smell it.

"Yeah, this is, Missy."

"You're his _Mistress_ ," says Bill. "Ugh, are you some kind of weird, kinky, sex robot?"

He doesn't have to see her to know Missy is grinning with evil glee. He sighs.

"No, my dear."

Bill doesn't sound impressed, even when she's not saying anything. Then,

"You've got lipstick on your mouth," she says to the Doctor, and there's the sound of her shoes moving away.

"Ooh," says Missy, sing-song. "It's almost as bad as telling her the truth, isn't it?"

"What?" says Bill, and panicking, the Doctor grabs Missy again.

"Hey, hey, hey," says Missy, in-between kisses. "Okay, okay, the truth is."

The Doctor squeezes Missy's waist, pulls her closer. " _Please_ ," he says, against her mouth.

For a moment, she stills in his arms, then brushes her hand down the side of his face, through his hair. She kisses him once, gently on the lips. Then she's spinning and moving out of his grip.

"Open marriage," Missy says. "Him and River. She knew all about what we were up to. He's just embarrassed, there's no great secret."

"Then - why are you all red, Doctor?" Bill asks.

"He likes to keep his asexual aesthetic intact," says Missy, and she leans up next to the Doctor, loops her arm around his waist. "Fits with his old mad scientist style. Doesn't it, babycakes?"

Nardole makes a noise of disgust. Missy kisses the Doctor on the cheek, her lips wet, with a loud smacking noise. The Doctor forces a smile, but expects it's more a grimace. 

Well, it's better than the alternative.

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> Hope you enjoyed it! Comments/feedback are always appreciated. The TV show, for those interested, is Spin City.


End file.
